Preschool Activities with Teach Me Mommy » timely tips

Better TV Watching

Wendi — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 14:00:13 +0000

With the weather getting colder and the days shorter, it’s often easy for children to start spending more and more time watching TV. Rather than give up, here are some simple things to make this a good activity in your preschool child’s life:

Decide together home much time they can watch TV a day.
Practice selective television viewing by going over the television guide in your Sunday paper and deciding in advance what you’re watching and when.
Watch your child’s television programs with them. This will allow you to make suggestions and to have discussions about what is being shown, making the activity more interactive and less passive.
Help your child to understand the difference between the world on television and his real world.
Use television viewing as a springboard to reading. For instance, a TV show about wild animals could prompt a visit to the library to find books on these subjects.
Help your child to avoid watching TV while eating a meal by having family meals away from the TV. A 2002 study from The Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center showed that children who eat meals in front of the TV spend more time watching TV—more time than it takes to eat their meals. They believe this promotes overeating and minimal activity and thus increases the risk of childhood obesity. The children in the study who watched more than 2 hours of TV a day weighed more than the children of the same age who watched less than 2 hours of TV a day.

So while TV may be an unavoidable part of most children’s lives, these simple ideas can maximize the positives and minimize the negatives.

Cheap winter undershirts

Jill — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 20:33:42 +0000

Instead of buying winter undershirts for your children, have them wear their short-sleeved summer t-shirts. They will probably be too small by next summer, so you can get more wear out of them by the children wearing them through the winter under heavier, long-sleeved shirts.

Don’t Lose Those Mittens!

Jill — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 15:18:47 +0000

One of the frustrating things that mothers have to constantly deal with in the winter is keeping track of mittens or gloves. This is a quick and easy idea: if your child’s coat has buttonholes, sew buttons to their gloves or mitten. That way he can just button his gloves to the coat when he takes it off.

Keeping track of presents

Jill — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 02:40:44 +0000

The wrappings from opened gifts at Christmas or Hanukkah at this time of the year can easily become a mess. An easy way to avoid this is to bring a plastic garbage bag wherever the gifts are being opened and put the wrappings immediately inside. This also avoids losing parts from newly opened toys in the piles of papers (something we’ve done before!)

Math and realistic Christmas gifts

Wendi — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 04:22:40 +0000

To teach your children to be realistic in making their Christmas lists, give them a toy catalog and let them look for three toys in a particular price range. It will help teach them about numbers, plus help them not have impossible expectations. You can also put your older children on toy store websites and have them search by price.

National Children’s Book Week

Jill — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 17:25:04 +0000

The third week in November is National Children’s Book Week. Plan to visit your local library on this week. Most libraries will have displays and programs to get your children excited about reading. One might think that taking a non-reading pre-schooler or even a toddler to the library is not productive. Many experts say that an early introduction to books is great way to stimulate a child’s mind and enhance a love of reading later in life. Besides, every child loves to see brightly colored pictures and hear a story in an animated voice. When my daughter-in-law lived in Vermont and throughout the long cold winters there, she took her toddler to “Story-Time” at the local library. It’s a great place to discover new books and mingle with other parents.

Take great photographs of children

Jill — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 20:28:26 +0000

Giving a child something to hold when they’re being photographed, such as a favorite toy or doll, will help them be more relaxed and less camera shy for pictures.